a) Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a goaltender's blocker for use in ice hockey, roller hockey, street hockey or any sport where such a blocker is used.
b) Description of the Prior Art
Conventional goaltender's blockers have a generally planar rectangular blocking pad having an outward-facing blocking area to stop or deflect pucks, and an inward-facing back side to which a glove is attached. The blocking pad can be flat, as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,700,404, for example; but most recent blocker designs now feature an outwardly-angled upper-end area, as in U.S. Pat. No. 5,564,122, for example.
In all blockers known to the inventor, one or more layers of foam and/or plastic and/or other such material are assembled so as to form a solid and mostly rigid blocking pad.
A particular problem that this invention seeks to solve is that the rigidity of such blocking pads has always created difficulties for goaltenders performing the so-called "paddle-down " maneuver, in which the whole length of the back edge of the stick's paddle is brought into contact with the playing surface. The problem is that the bottom edge of a conventional blocker's rigid blocking pad protrudes by several inches from the glove to which it is attached and thus comes into contact with the playing surface before the stick's paddle does, leaving a gap between the back edge of the paddle and the playing surface where the puck can slide underneath the addle and into the net or within reach of an opponent's stick.
Past attempts at solving this long-standing problem have included goaltenders trying to hold their sticks further out in front of themselves, bending their wrists and pressing down hard in an attempt to bend the blocking pad enough to allow better contact between back edge of paddle and playing surface. This maneuver is usually somewhat uncomfortable, awkward and even painful at times; it is also quite inefficient.
For some time now, goaltenders have intentionally and permanently deformed the blocking pad of their blocker, bending and twisting it into whatever shape they felt would offer the least resistance and allow the easiest contact between the paddle and the playing surface. Manufacturers now produce and sell blocker models in which the usual rigid, one-piece blocking pads are already bent, curved and otherwise distorted to the same end.
Such compromise solutions, however, result in a permanently distorted and poorly balanced blocking pad in which the protective qualities and the effective height and/or width of the lower-end blocking area are reduced, as compared to those of an intact flat-padded blocker.